Former US Attorneys, FBI Special Agent in Charge Reiterate Support for WA State-level Effort to Improve Marijuana Enforcement Policy

October 15, 2012 - 9:38am

Voters in Washington State are poised to adopt a new approach to our state’s marijuana policy. Former federal officials insisting on rigid enforcement of laws criminalizing marijuana have now intruded again into our state’s effort, repeating their previous call for the U.S. Department of Justice to announce opposition before the voters have even had the opportunity to speak. We believe the Justice Department should maintain its current position of appropriate restraint and refrain from premature statements of policy related to state initiatives.

As recently serving U.S. Attorneys and the former FBI Special Agent in Charge in Seattle, we are dismayed to see this misguided attempt to influence state elections. The Department of Justice should not preemptively announce enforcement plans in response to state voter initiatives concerning marijuana. The people of our State of Washington, as well as other states considering changes to their own state marijuana laws, ought to be able to exercise the right to vote on their own laws free of intimidating and premature efforts to announce federal enforcement plans and influence the outcome of state elections.